Let's talk about Medusa since she's released.

An old time player here who simply loves the game and how it's been evolving.

I remember playing her 5 years ago (wow). This was when meta was 'farm all day with little action and win big late'. Games lasted 45 mins at the earliest.

Mana and HP regen were much slower due the to lack of powerful cheap items we have today: No Soul Ring, Arcane Boots (only Arcane Ring), Drums, Medallion, Urn, Aquila, Forcestaff, Armlet, and so on. Combined with less kill and assist bounty, no smoke, and longer spawn timer, the game was played very conservatively with far less action. It's not the fun & blood-crazed gankfest we see today.

I bring all this up because I feel like Medusa has changed the least (if barely any) since the old days. While items, system, the whole game got a HUGE boost, Medusa feels left behind. Even formerly outdated heroes got ridiculous buffs to 'man up' the action- Axe got Hunger, Drow got +80 agility, huge stat gain on PL, Bat got 5 sentences of buffs, and so on.

I played few games with Medusa now, and she feels like a relic:

• Her shtick is to tank and deal massive AOE damage late game. Well tankiness means little today when you're ganked so easily. I guess this explains the game suggesting Phase on her, not the good ol' Treads. She has no escape. Her ultimate is expensive (CD-wise) and a soft escape at best.
• As for her split shot, it felt totally pale compared to Gyro's Flak Cannon. He's the new kid in town. Flak is the concentrated can-o'-whopass version of the ancient Split Shot. While Medusa struggles to clear big waves, summons, and heroes 5 arrows at a time, Flak hit ALL of them. Also 600 range feels very limited while Flak does 1000 range that 'chases' poor fleeting supports. Yes it's CD based, but it's short and bursty, which is what Dota likes. Also it suffers from no damage reduction (-20% of Split).
• Medusa only has Mystic Snake early/mid game. They're quite powerful at that stage, and serves as a great anti push. But it can't compare to the utility that Gyro offers with Rocket Barrage and the ever annoying Homing Rocket.
• All in all, I just feel Medusa feels like a relic of the past. Even Morph got a huge buff couple years ago with the introduction of Ethereal Blade.

She's just a bumbling hero that doesn't 'impact' the game much early/mid, and is outshined by other carries late, especially Gyro. She deserves a big remake or big set of buffs just like the recent oldies did (PL, Drow, to name a few).

What are your thoughts?